So science fiction is cool again. Thank God for that. But it's been a few years coming. I think there are a couple of reasons for its resurgence. The primary one being Mr JJ Abrams and his Star Trek reboot, and a very fine reboot it is too. Add to this James Cameron's upcoming Avatar, Peter Jackson dabbling with District 9, Sam Rockwell on the Moon, and Terminator Salvation, and we've got a busy and exciting horizon in the genre.
When Arthur C Clarke passed away last year I was surprised that there wasn't a clamour in Hollywood to greenlight what could potentially be the next "2001" in memory of the visionary author (and I don't mean "2061"). So here's my tuppence-worth. The three Arthur C Clarke books I think should be made into films.
Rendezvous with Rama: Being the first of 4 books, this has scope for a franchise. The story centres around a strange cylindrical spaceship some 40km across that drifts into our solar system. A team is sent to investigate. The film project has been in development hell since the nineties, when Morgan Freeman acquired the rights to make it, got David Fincher on board, and decided to play Commander Norton himself. A release date was set for New Years Day 2000, and I vowed to be at the front of the queue when it was released. Websites were set up, deals struck with Intel for the technology aspect, David Fincher postulated ideas about hand-held cameras in a pure digital environment. The special effects in Independence Day proved that it was possible to represent sheer size on camera (the best example being where a satellite zips past the camera only to crash into the side of a huge mothership). This is the project that had fans salivating, but since Morgan Freeman's recent car accident, Fincher has gone on the record that the project has ground to a halt. Really really sad, for now. But I think this one might still come out, and I think Cameron's Avatar might be the thing that kicks this one back into production. I hope so.
A Fall of Moondust: A great disaster story set on the moon, where dust seas act like liquid water due to reduced gravity. A tourist "boat" gets stuck on a voyage and sinks below the surface. What follows is a race against time to find and rescue the passengers before the air runs out. The resolution to this story is intelligent and believable. A Fall of Moondust would make a great sci-fi movie which I would love to see realised on the big screen. It could be great opportunity to put up some vibrant and exciting lunar landscapes in glorious widescreen.
The Trigger: I worked for a time in Sudan a few years ago. One morning I was at breakfast in our company staff house, when our security officer told me that during the night a young boy was caught by the police trying to break into one of the company cars outside the gates. I was told that he would probably be taken to a station, have the sh*t kicked out of him, and be sent to the south of the country to be handed a gun to fight in the territorial war that rages down there. At the time I was reading The Trigger, and it had a real effect on me. This is a story of a group of scientists who accidentally invent a device that ignites any explosives within a certain radius. This effectively means they can disable weapons and firearms at a distance. They spend the rest of the book trying to come to terms with the implications of such an invention, and so does the rest of the world. From a form of disarmament, to a protector, to a new form of terrorism. This book teaches us that scientific discovery is a gathering snowball crashing down a steep mountain, and sometime's we're only along for the ride. A good political thriller with a lot of cinematic potential.
So let's honour the great man and get one of these made. Is "2001: A Space Odyssey" set to be his only major screen legacy?
When Arthur C Clarke passed away last year I was surprised that there wasn't a clamour in Hollywood to greenlight what could potentially be the next "2001" in memory of the visionary author (and I don't mean "2061"). So here's my tuppence-worth. The three Arthur C Clarke books I think should be made into films.
Rendezvous with Rama: Being the first of 4 books, this has scope for a franchise. The story centres around a strange cylindrical spaceship some 40km across that drifts into our solar system. A team is sent to investigate. The film project has been in development hell since the nineties, when Morgan Freeman acquired the rights to make it, got David Fincher on board, and decided to play Commander Norton himself. A release date was set for New Years Day 2000, and I vowed to be at the front of the queue when it was released. Websites were set up, deals struck with Intel for the technology aspect, David Fincher postulated ideas about hand-held cameras in a pure digital environment. The special effects in Independence Day proved that it was possible to represent sheer size on camera (the best example being where a satellite zips past the camera only to crash into the side of a huge mothership). This is the project that had fans salivating, but since Morgan Freeman's recent car accident, Fincher has gone on the record that the project has ground to a halt. Really really sad, for now. But I think this one might still come out, and I think Cameron's Avatar might be the thing that kicks this one back into production. I hope so. A Fall of Moondust: A great disaster story set on the moon, where dust seas act like liquid water due to reduced gravity. A tourist "boat" gets stuck on a voyage and sinks below the surface. What follows is a race against time to find and rescue the passengers before the air runs out. The resolution to this story is intelligent and believable. A Fall of Moondust would make a great sci-fi movie which I would love to see realised on the big screen. It could be great opportunity to put up some vibrant and exciting lunar landscapes in glorious widescreen.The Trigger: I worked for a time in Sudan a few years ago. One morning I was at breakfast in our company staff house, when our security officer told me that during the night a young boy was caught by the police trying to break into one of the company cars outside the gates. I was told that he would probably be taken to a station, have the sh*t kicked out of him, and be sent to the south of the country to be handed a gun to fight in the territorial war that rages down there. At the time I was reading The Trigger, and it had a real effect on me. This is a story of a group of scientists who accidentally invent a device that ignites any explosives within a certain radius. This effectively means they can disable weapons and firearms at a distance. They spend the rest of the book trying to come to terms with the implications of such an invention, and so does the rest of the world. From a form of disarmament, to a protector, to a new form of terrorism. This book teaches us that scientific discovery is a gathering snowball crashing down a steep mountain, and sometime's we're only along for the ride. A good political thriller with a lot of cinematic potential.So let's honour the great man and get one of these made. Is "2001: A Space Odyssey" set to be his only major screen legacy?
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